I Have to Hate You
by Poecilotheria
Summary: Allowing Magolor to stay at his base along with the other Star Allies opens up some old wounds for Meta Knight. Magolor decides to do some snooping to figure out why Meta still hasn't forgiven him, and discovers something startling.


Magolor wished that he was anywhere else right now. More specifically, Magolor wished that he was somewhere that Meta wasn't. The knight was towering over him, which would usually be impossible considering the man's diminutive height, but Meta had taken the liberty of kicking Magolor in the shin hard enough to force him to the ground. Magolor looked towards the exit, which unfortunately had the angry man blocking it.

"Are you going to tell me what you were doing in my quarters, or will I have to injure you more severely this time?" Meta snarled, glowering at Magolor. Magolor put his hands up in a pacifying gesture.

"I just wanted to talk to you! I couldn't find you anywhere!" he said, backing up a little further. Magolor winced as he backed into the wall, realizing how futile escape was. Meta pointed at the worn notebook in Magolor's hand.

"And that involved retrieving that out of my locked drawer?" Meta quipped, looking borderline murderous. Magolor swallowed thickly.

"Look, I was curious OK? And your diary was in one of two locked drawers, and I _don't_ want to know what's in the one under your bed," he explained. Meta bristled, his eyes tinging red under his visor.

"It is a captain's log. What are you trying to gain here? Blackmail? Some way to manipulate me?" he hissed.

"OK, fine, your captain's log was in a locked drawer and I was curious. I just wanted to know what you really thought of me," Magolor said.

"What do I think of you?" Meta said, putting a hand to his chin in a mock show of thoughtfulness, "Let us see, whatever do I think of a man that betrayed me and attempted to use my considerable goodwill to murder both me and my companions in cold blood? What on earth would such actions cause one to feel? Truly a baffling mystery for the ages."

"Look, I was curious what you thought of me before the whole…betrayal thing. It's pretty obvious what you think now, unless violence and death threats are how you show you care," Magolor responded.

"So, you invaded my privacy after I was kind enough to allow you to stay within my base? Do you realize what sort of danger you are in right now?" Meta snarled.

"You only let me in here with the others because Kirby trusts me. Which makes me wonder why _you_ still don't trust me, if you supposedly defer to his judgement. Or it _did_ make me wonder," Magolor replied. He was fully aware of how dangerous Meta was, and that he had a grudge against him. But he had to know what was up with the content of the diary…

"I defer to no one's judgement but my own. What game are you playing here?" Meta snapped. "Because I want no part in it."

"Yeah, sure, you aren't the least bit curious as to what parts I read in there. Did you forget what you wrote? I would've thought you'd be angrier with me for reading _this_ one," Magolor said, holding up the pilfered notebook. Meta read the dates scrawled across the front and blanched.

"What did you read?" Meta said, sounding distant. Magolor idly flipped through the book, watching the dates on the pages go by.

"Enough to know why you hate me so much. Do you get attached easily? I'm guessing that you don't," Magolor said, scanning a page. "You write exactly how you talk, you know? And your handwriting is awful, so it took me a little longer than I thought it would to read this."

"What did you read?!" Meta snarled, looming over Magolor with clenched fists.

"_I love him, I think. But would I even know love if I felt it? There is no reference material I trust on this topic. Perhaps I should speak with him, but the notion makes my chest feel heavy,_" Magolor read. The notebook was ripped from his hands and tossed aside as Meta menaced him.

"Enough!" he hissed. A few stray pages of the book fluttered to the floor as Magolor looked up at him. He should have been terrified and begging Meta not to hurt him, but he was only curious.

"Was that really what you felt?" he asked. Meta sneered at him, straightening up a little. His eyes were still blood red, and the edges of his cape warped and flickered as his emotions aggravated his magic.

"Does it matter? If there was ever anything there you have most assuredly destroyed it. Do you think you deserve forgiveness? Or are you trying to steal it from me by using my words against me?" Meta snarled. "I will not be manipulated and humiliated into forgetting what you have done to me."

"Done to _you_? There were three other people there who have moved on. Are you forgetting them, or did I hurt you worse?" Magolor asked. Meta let out a sudden humorless laugh, startling the Halcandran.

"You do not even care, you only want some reason to believe that I am in the wrong. Something to cling to that tells you that it is not your fault," he said, disbelief in his tone.

"If I didn't care, I would've run right out the door the second you found me," Magolor said.

"This is how you care? By invading my privacy and questioning my emotions? What do you want from me?" Meta snapped.

"I want to earn your forgiveness, that's all. I can't do that until I know why you hate me."

"You do not know why I hate you? Even after all of this, you cannot conceptualize why I would loathe you?" Meta said, gesturing angrily, "Can you really not understand what you did? Every single moment of happiness, every single conversation we had, it was all rendered meaningless in a single moment. Everything was a farce and I fell for it." Meta started to clap, the movement sarcastic and slow as he continued to speak, "Congratulations, Magolor! You fooled me entirely! You conned me out of even my own emotions, how impressive!"

"I didn't fake it!" Magolor responded, his voice coming out more forceful than he intended it to. He then took a breath to calm himself before continuing. "When we talked or hung out, I wasn't faking that. I'm not that good of an actor," he clarified.

"How could I possibly believe a word you say? Everything you did was a means to an end," Meta said coldly.

"I'm not the kind of mastermind you think I am. You guys were easy to fool." Magolor regretted his words the second they left his mouth, and Meta's eyes flared with renewed rage.

"Easy to fool? We were not expecting to be preyed upon in return for our kindness!" Meta snarled, looming over Magolor.

"No, wait, I didn't mean-"

"Were we just begging to be taken advantage of? Is that your justification?" Meta continued, his voice growing steadily louder as he spoke.

"No! Look, I'm just trying to say that I didn't fake liking you. I still…" Magolor trailed off, carefully thinking over his next words. "I want to go back to before I fucked up. You wouldn't believe how badly I want that."

"Wanting to be free from consequences-"

"I want my friends back dammit! Can you get past your self-righteous bullshit for just a second and stop assuming that you know everything about me?" Magolor shouted, magic flaring around his hands.

"Self-righteous? You brought all of this on yourself!" Meta's own magic was becoming more unstable, and his cape was sending out wisps of energy.

"I know that! Just stop assuming the worst of me for once!"

"I assumed the best when we first met and look how that ended!"

"I've changed! Why can't you accept that?"

"BECAUSE YOU HURT ME!" Meta roared, startling Magolor. His cape melded into his wings and he flared the massive appendages above his head. The man was breathing heavily as he clenched his fists, and Magolor braced himself for any possible blows.

"Sir?" The two men looked towards the source of the voice. Mace Knight stood in the doorway, giving them a look of confusion. "What's going on?" he asked. Meta stepped back from Magolor, his wings falling into a neutral position.

"Nothing. Escort him back to his quarters," Meta said curtly, stalking out of the room and brushing past Mace. The knight watched his commander disappear down the hallway before turning to Magolor with a suspicious look.

"Come with me," he ordered.

It had been a solid hour since his spat with Meta, and Magolor was seriously considering just returning to the Lor. Sure, it was more convenient to stay with the other Star Allies for planning and training purposes, but he didn't want to see Meta more than he had to. It was partially due to his fear of Meta outright attacking him, and partially due to what the man had said to him earlier.

Magolor sighed and laid back onto the bed. He'd gotten close to Meta back when they were still friends, and his positive feelings towards the man hadn't changed since. Meta was powerful, confident, and wickedly smart. These traits had become very apparent in the hours the knight had spent helping Magolor repair and study the Lor, but there were more subtle things about him that Magolor had learned as well. Like his dry sense of humor that was easily missed, his tendency to wheeze when he really laughed, and his tendency to fidget with his cape when he was nervous. He'd felt close to him, and if he was totally honest his feelings had occasionally crept past purely platonic. Apparently, Meta had felt the same, and this revelation only gave Magolor a cold, hollow feeling in his gut. There'd been potential there, a faint spark, and he'd managed to destroy it in one fell swoop.

There was a loud knocking at his door, and Magolor seriously considered telling whoever was there to leave. He then decided that anything to keep his mind off Meta was a good thing and called out to his visitor.

"Come in," he said. The door opened and a familiar large figure entered and stood at the foot of Magolor's bed.

"What did you do?" the man accused, his angry stance and expression a far cry from his usual jovial self. Magolor pulled himself up to sit with his back resting against the headboard.

"Oh, hello your majesty," Magolor greeted, forcing a cheerful tone. Dedede only scowled at him.

"Meta stormed off more upset than I've seen him in months, and Mace told me that you were in his room arguin' with him. What did you do?" Dedede snapped. Magolor sighed heavily.

"It's just that, we had a disagreement," he said, hoping that Dedede wouldn't press the issue.

"Bullshit, he wouldn't be this upset over an argument. So, I'm gonna ask you one more time. What did you do to him?" Dedede said lowly. Magolor became acutely aware of the fact that in this confined space the much larger man would have very little trouble making his day go from bad to worse. So, he decided to tell the truth, sincerely hoping that it wouldn't incense the king even more than dancing around the issue.

"I…read his diary," Magolor admitted, and Dedede looked at him with wide eyes. The king then sighed loudly and rubbed at his face with his hand.

"Do I even want to know why? I'm surprised that he didn't outright kill you for that stunt," he groaned.

"I just wanted to know why he hadn't moved on when you and the other two had. I want him to forgive me, but I have to know why he hates me first," Magolor explained.

"You want him to not hate you, so you do somethin' you know will piss him off? He's already stressed about Dark and the robot girl bein' here, he doesn't need you buggin' him on top of that," Dedede scolded, jabbing an accusatory finger at the Halcandran.

"I did figure it out though," Magolor said weakly, causing Dedede to give him an exasperated expression.

"So, you know why he hates you, but you made him hate you even more. Great, just perfect. Your methods are really workin' out here," the king drawled. Magolor frowned and looked away.

"He used to love me…" he muttered. Dedede startled him by throwing up his hands.

"No shit! You really didn't notice? It took readin' his diary to know that you hurt him the most 'cause he liked you the most?" he snapped, looming over the bed.

"I didn't realize…" Magolor murmured, and his miserable tone caused a fair amount of Dedede's anger to dissipate. The king let out another deep sigh.

"You destroyed him, Magolor. Not only did you backstab him, he thought he'd helped kill you. We all hurt after that, but it hit him the hardest," Dedede said, shaking his head. "He made you a grave, you know. We all visited it."

"I'm so sorry…" Magolor said, his voice almost a whisper. He'd caused them all so much pain, and then he'd continued to torment one of them out of his own selfish need for closure. The thought made his eyes mist up.

"I know you're sorry, and so do Bandanna and Kirby. But Meta doesn't," Dedede said. He then shifted and put his hands on his hips, seemingly considering something. "You know those cliffs near the base, right? And how there's a part of them that juts out over the ocean?" Magolor sifted through his mental map of the area and nodded, a little confused at why Dedede was asking him this.

"I've seen it, yeah," he replied.

"That's where the grave was before Meta destroyed it. I'll bet money that he's up there broodin' right now." Dedede noticed the confusion in Magolor's eyes and explained. "Go up there and apologize to him. Maybe you can at least stop him from addin' readin' his diary to his list of reasons to hate you."

"I…" Magolor trailed off, but quickly found his resolve. "I can do that."

"Good," Dedede said, offering him a pleased smile. "Then you'd better get goin' before it gets dark out."

A strong ocean breeze whipped over the cliff, buffeting the scrub that clung to the rocks and causing Magolor's cloak to billow out around him. It was a sheer drop down to the crashing waves below on either side of the massive edifice, and Magolor stuck firmly to the very center of the path. Perfecting his magic to where he could fly rather than just levitate was a recent development, and he still had a healthy fear of heights. The sun had just begun to dip below the horizon, and the tapestry of fiery color that lit up the sky silhouetted the figure that sat at the rocky precipice ahead. As Magolor approached him, he noted that the remains of what must have been a carved section of rock were scattered around the area.

He walked until he was a few feet behind Meta and then stood silently, searching for the right words. The man hadn't acknowledged his presence, and with how sharp Magolor knew his senses were there was no way that he didn't know he was there. Meta's helmet sat on the ground beside him, and his indigo hair ruffled gently in the breeze as he stared resolutely ahead. His wings were folded behind him.

"Hey," Magolor greeted. There was no response, and he took a deep breath before sitting beside Meta. He snuck a sidelong glance at the man's face and watched as Meta's eyes snapped back to staring straight ahead. Magolor had seen his face a few times before, so Meta's cute appearance was no surprise. The bags beneath those wide doe eyes seemed deeper than before. "The sunset is beautiful here," Magolor added absently. Meta continued to ignore him, so he sighed and unlatched his cloak, shrugging it off and setting it behind him. If Meta wasn't going to cover his face, neither was Magolor. The motion finally prompted a response.

"Leave," Meta said curtly. Magolor sighed and turned his head towards the knight.

"No can do, sorry," he replied. Meta turned slightly to regard him, his eyes lingering on Magolor's mouth. Two scars extended out from the corners, a remnant of his mutation at the hands of the Master Crown. He looked forward again.

"I do not wish to play mind games with you. Leave," he said, fury creeping into his tone. Magolor kept looking at him, his usual mischief absent from his face.

"I want to apologize," he said quietly. Meta's pointed ears flicked at his serious tone, but he still refused to make eye contact.

"I do not forgive you," he replied. Magolor slumped a little and fidgeted with his hands, but his resolve remained. He carefully considered his next words.

"I know, but I want you to know that I'm sorry. For everything," Magolor said slowly. "Even if you never want to even look at me again, I want you to know that I'm sorry I hurt you. I wish I didn't, and I wish we could go back to before, but…" Magolor's words deserted him, and they sat in silence for a long while as the sun dipped lower.

"That sort of pain does not simply vanish with an apology," Meta said, his tone carefully blank.

"I know. I want to fix this, but I don't even know if it's possible. It might not be," Magolor responded, shaking his head.

"Perhaps not," Meta said simply, still gazing ahead. The light of the setting sun made his eyes a rich amber tone.

"I just…" Magolor paused before continuing. "I just wish we were still friends. It's such a selfish thing to want, but I want to go back to working on the Lor together, or practicing our magic, or combing the database. Hell, even just sitting together, or talking about nothing, or those nights where you came out for your midnight snack and kept me company. I still even have the book you lent me, but I can't finish it because I'll just remember that I can't talk to you about it when I'm done."

"You remember all of that," Meta said simply. It was a statement, not a question, but Magolor still felt the need to answer it.

"I remember how you were so eager for me to finish that book because you wanted someone to talk to about the twist ending. How you joked that I was like the main character and you were like the side character, and how you'd beat up the shitty love interest if he was real. Fuck, I remember most of the conversations we had, because I wish we had more of them," Magolor rambled. "I'm such a pathetic piece of shit that I imagine you still talking to me sometimes, and how you'd react to things. Do you remember the last conversation we had, before I fucked up?" Magolor had expected Meta to take a moment to remember it, but he answered immediately.

"I asked if you would like to explore Halcandra with me and study the ruins, and you agreed," he said, his tone stiff. Magolor nodded and looked at Meta, his eyes starting to mist up.

"I wish I'd done that. I wish we could've explored together and had more of those conversations. I wish it wasn't just a what if." Tears threatened to spill over from his eyes, and Magolor wiped furiously at them. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry…" he sobbed, and tears began to drip down his face despite his efforts. Meta remained staring forward, but his hand gripped a little at the rock beneath him. Magolor jumped a little as a hand rested on his shoulder.

"You do not realize how easy it would be for me to return to how we were. To pretend that nothing happened. I cannot do that," Meta said.

"I know-"

"But," Meta continued, turning to face Magolor for the first time. "I can accept your apology, and I can allow you a chance at working towards a redemption." Magolor looked at him with wide eyes.

"You mean that?" he asked.

"There is no indication of insincerity on your part, and if I do not allow you to attempt to fix what you have done then there will truly be no chance of returning to how we were. And in the end, holding this grudge… It hurts far more than accepting what you did and moving on," Meta said, looking away and removing his hand from the man's shoulder. Magolor couldn't stop from grinning at his words.

"I can do that. I'll earn your forgiveness, I promise. And I'll leave your diary alone this time," he said, wiping his face. Meta gave him a mildly irritated look.

"Captain's log. And you had better, I will not suffer such an intrusion a second time," he huffed.

"Right, captain's log," Magolor replied, resisting the considerable urge to tease Meta about his unwillingness to call it a diary. Another long silence fell as they watched the sun slowly vanish below the horizon and the stars twinkle into sight. The sky was clear, and they could clearly see distant planets and galaxies glimmering against the canvas of the night sky.

"Do you know how the book ended?" Meta asked. The gentle light of the stars and the moon made it almost seem like he was dusted with silver, and his luminous eyes gave his face a golden hue.

"Like I said, I never finished it. So, no," Magolor said, glancing at him.

"The twist I wanted you to read is that the romantic interest is the villain, and the two characters that were similar to us defeat him and end up together," Meta said, still watching the stars.

"Is this your revenge? Spoiling books?" Magolor quipped, chuckling a little. Meta didn't laugh.

"That was how I was going to tell you," he said quietly.

"Tell me what?" Magolor asked, turning to look at Meta. The knight only glanced at him before tilting his head up, keeping his eyes fixed on the night sky.

"Your snooping should make what I am referring to blatantly obvious," he said, and Magolor slumped a little as he realized what Meta was referring to.

"Right, the whole feelings thing," he said, his cat-like ears flattening against his head.

"Yes," Meta responded curtly, still refusing to look at Magolor. The silence that fell was unbearable, and Magolor felt remarkably hollow despite the emotions swirling around in his head. He couldn't help but think of how things might have been now if he had never gone through with his betrayal. What would he be doing now, and would he still feel empty? What would he be to the man next to him if he'd never given Meta a reason to hate him? Magolor steeled himself and shifted so that he sat facing Meta.

"Can I ask you something without you getting pissed?" he asked. Meta glanced at him without moving his head.

"If you feel the need to phrase your request like that, it will almost certainly irritate me," he said evenly. Meta then felt Magolor's eyes bore into him and sighed. "Though I feel like you will say what you wish to say regardless."

"Those feelings you had…" Magolor started, before losing his nerve and trailing off. He took a breath and quickly gathered his courage. "They're gone now, right?" He was met with absolute silence from the other, and he was about to tell Meta to just forget it when he finally spoke.

"I do not truly know what I feel now. Or what I am supposed to feel," Meta said. His tone was blank, but in a way that suggested that he'd carefully stripped any emotion from it.

"I don't think you're 'supposed' to feel anything. It's just your emotions." Meta sighed and closed his eyes, frowning deeply.

"I have great difficulty identifying my emotions. At least knowing how I am expected to feel can contextualize them somewhat," he explained, looking irritated. His eyes opened again as Magolor spoke, and the motion made the Halcandran realize just how brightly they glowed.

"Try describing how you feel then. Like what your emotions make you do or want." Those glowing eyes narrowed.

"I will not suffer your attempts to play psychotherapist with me," Meta snapped, causing Magolor to roll his eyes.

"It's the simplest way to figure this out," he replied, causing Meta to calm himself a little and consider the other's words. It took a solid minute for him to speak.

"I feel pain," Meta said simply.

"OK, and…?" Magolor urged, earning a glare from Meta.

"I feel as if it is important to hate you," Meta continued.

"It's important to hate me?" Magolor said, confusion plastered across his face. Meta seemed to regret his words.

"It explains everything. Like how I remember everything so clearly, or how you continue to be on my mind. It even explains wishing to seek you out. A simple obsession born of a need for vengeance," Meta said, speaking more to himself than to Magolor.

"It sounds like you're trying to convince yourself of that rather than believing it," Magolor said. Meta snapped his head to face him, his irises tinging red.

"That sounds like wishful thinking on your part," he snapped, sneering at Magolor. The Halcandran refused to back down.

"So you hate me?" he asked.

"I hate what you did," Meta replied.

"But not me?" Magolor pressed. Meta looked away, stiffening his posture.

"…No," he said curtly.

"Then if it isn't hatred, what else would explain your feelings?" Magolor asked. Meta turned so that Magolor could see the side of his face, and his eyes were wide.

"Love, infatuation, longing…" Meta murmured, his voice barely audible above the breeze. Magolor's jaw very nearly dropped open.

"You…I didn't expect you to say it…" he sputtered. Meta grit his teeth and pressed his hands to his face.

"I do not want this," he hissed. Magolor reached out towards the man.

"Look, it's fine, we-"

"I do not want to be so weak as to still love somebody who hurt me!" Meta snarled, grabbing Magolor's wrist and shoving his hand away. He looked almost panicked, and his grip was tight enough to hurt.

"Let go, that hurts!" Magolor pleaded. Meta's wings were flared and twitching, and his eyes were pinned.

"To be put through so much pain and still want to be with the person who inflicted it… How pathetic," Meta spat, roughly releasing his grip on Magolor's wrist. Magolor winced and cradled the limb, hoping that it didn't bruise too severely. Meta curled in on himself and covered his face again, causing Magolor to feel a sharp pang of sympathy for the man.

"If it's any consolation, I still like you," he said quietly. Meta stilled before lunging out and grabbing Magolor by his collar, yanking the taller man down to eye level.

"It is not! Can you even comprehend the suffering you have wrought? I can accept that you are sorry, but it does not erase what you did and what you caused! I mourned for you, I grieved for you, and you just fucking waltzed back into existence and destroyed any shred of closure I had!" Meta screamed, his voice ringing out loudly around the clifftop.

"Meta, please-"

"Those little 'what if' scenarios, those idiotic fantasies? They are not so harmless when there is a possibility of them coming true! They are not so harmless when every useless fucking synapse of your brain is screaming at you to just forgive and forget, to just pick up where you left off, because any chance at filling the gaping hole that was left is worth risking being hurt a second time!" he continued, his sharp fangs glinting in the moonlight as he spoke. Magolor's ears were flattened against his head as he shivered a little in fear, but he forced himself to keep eye contact with Meta.

"I'm not asking you to forget, or even forgive. I just…" Magolor trailed off and looked down. "It's selfish, Nova above it's selfish, but… I want to make it so you don't feel like you have to hate me." Meta's grip on his collar weakened.

"I hate how easy it would be to give in. I hate fighting with myself to stay in control. I hate that even now there is some part of me that is positively giddy at how physically close I am to you right now," Meta said, bowing his head until his face was obscured. "But most of all," he added, "I hate how I cannot bring myself to truly hate you." He lifted his head to look at Magolor again, and his eyes had lost their fire. They looked tired and glistened a little in the low light.

"I'm sorry," Magolor said simply. Meta released his grip.

"I know," he muttered. He looked miserable and listless, and Magolor rested a hand on his shoulder.

"Is there anything I can do?" he asked. Meta looked at his hand for a long moment. He then grabbed Magolor and pulled him close, nestling his head into the crook of the man's neck. Magolor could feel him trembling against his chest.

"For now, just remain quiet," Meta whispered. Magolor closed his eyes and hesitantly returned the embrace.

"Alright," he replied.

_(The book they talk about is totally made up BTW)_


End file.
